Yep, real. Airtran Flight 4 (A320) on July 13, 2004, shortly after it departed ATL for MCO. Returned to ATL. Uneventful landing.

Quoting Trent1000 (Thread starter):If so, would the aircraft be able to take off safely if that engine were not operational?

The engine was working OK. The cover over a part of it was off, but the engine was still doing its magic. Think of it this way: if you shed your clothes in public, would your body still work? Answer: yes, it would, even if it looks a bit embarrassing to the general public. No different from this particular situation.

Quote:On July 13, 2004, about 1200 eastern daylight time, an Airbus Industrie A320-233, N951LF, operated by Ryan International Airlines, Inc., as AirTran Airways Flight 4, returned for landing after a portion of the left engine cowling separated from the airplane

Quoting DingDong (Reply 3):The engine was working OK. The cover over a part of it was off, but the engine was still doing its magic. Think of it this way: if you shed your clothes in public, would your body still work? Answer: yes, it would, even if it looks a bit embarrassing to the general public. No different from this particular situation.

Your body isn't travelling 600mph. Are all the lines and harnesses designed to survive the airstream like that?

Quoting Nomadd22 (Reply 7):Your body isn't travelling 600mph. Are all the lines and harnesses designed to survive the airstream like that?

That's a fair point.

But in this specific incident, the engine did continue to work correctly -- whether designed for it or not. Doesn't mean it's a great idea to operate in that manner -- return or divert would be appropriate in such cases, and was indeed done.

I remember when it happened. It was a HUGE deal in the discussion forums.
It was just one negative incident, but it contributed to AirTran's overall hate of the A320 experiment, which purportedly had a terrible dispatch reliability. They ended up ordering 737s rather than 32X family aircraft. AND they canned Ryan Int'l.

Quoting Nomadd22 (Reply 7):Are all the lines and harnesses designed to survive the airstream like that?

I suspect that's probably a requirement, but all the lines and harnesses are definitely designed to survive the vibration g's due to a lost blade, which is going to be significantly higher than air loads.

Quoting AA737-823 (Reply 13):I remember when it happened. It was a HUGE deal in the discussion forums.
It was just one negative incident, but it contributed to AirTran's overall hate of the A320 experiment, which purportedly had a terrible dispatch reliability. They ended up ordering 737s rather than 32X family aircraft. AND they canned Ryan Int'l.

This is not totally true ...

The use of Ryan International and the Airbus aircraft had nothing to do with the Air Tran ordering 737's. The 737's were already on order when Ryan was contracted. The reliability rate can very well lie with the operator as well as the airframe.

That being said - most operators with V2500 engines require a log book entry prior to dispatch due to the fact that the fan cowls look closed even when not latched. On other aircraft - the is a gap and it is obvious they are open.

Quoting 7673mech (Reply 19):The use of Ryan International and the Airbus aircraft had nothing to do with the Air Tran ordering 737's. The 737's were already on order when Ryan was contracted. The reliability rate can very well lie with the operator as well as the airframe

The Ryan contract had already started when FL ordered the 737's. It was a few months into it that FL decided between the A319 and the 73G.

Gee. I seem to recall this foto being passed around to all of us at HP a few years back. And that it was one of our a/c.....as it was told it happend over Kansas, then diverted to ICT. Cant get factual evidence on this anymore since I no longer work at HP/US, but im not so sure it was an a/c on lease to FL.
Ok everyone start flaming me....JD CRPXE

Quoting AA737-823 (Reply 13):I remember when it happened. It was a HUGE deal in the discussion forums.
It was just one negative incident, but it contributed to AirTran's overall hate of the A320 experiment, which purportedly had a terrible dispatch reliability. They ended up ordering 737s rather than 32X family aircraft.

The cause of the incident was the latches on the cowl doors and no "alert" mechanism for when they didn't lock.

The cause of the incident was a maintenance guy who basically just slammed the door shut. This is not an uncommon habit, and usually the latches work just fine and lock, but occasionally they don't. It was never an encouraged practice to do this, and people were supposed to get on their hands and knees to visually confirm the door was locked in place, but people get into bad habits easily, perhaps (and this is just speculation) as it is very rare for the latch to fail so people perhaps assume it always functions.

Anyways, in this particular event, the latch didn't lock into place, and when the aircraft reached a certain speed (cant remember if that was in the air or on the runway), the airflow got sufficient purchase on the doors to rip them open.

The upshot of this is that almost all cowl doors now have a spring system in them to open the door again if the latch is not locked, so even if people slam them shut there isn't a chance of the aircraft departing with cowls unlocked.

25 DingDong
: No flaming, but highly unlikely. Reg was N951LF, and given its history, doesn't look like it ever was in HP's fleet.

26 Falstaff
: You might be thinking of a HP CRJ. I remember seeing photos of a HP CRJ a few years ago that had a destroyed engine on it. I don't recall where the f

27 OPNLguy
: For that matter, neither is the aircraft pictured. Yes, I know 500-600mph speeds are commonly given to passengers, but that reflects the aircraft's s

28 242
: You can see in this photo that the slat outboard of the engine sustained some damage when the outboard fan cowl departed.

29 Steinberger45
: This issue has happened more than you think. More back in the 90's when the buses were first being intergraited into the airlines. I remember some bod

30 Arffguy
: This issue has happened numerous times. I thought I had heard UAL and AWA have had it so ABQopsHP may be correct.

31 AirTran717
: Being that I worked for FL at the time of the incident... Ryan had more mechanical issues in the first week of our contract than our own, whole compa

32 VirginFlyer
: Um, I think you may be under a mistaken impression here, although the point you make is still valid. TAS is the aircraft's speed relative to the air

33 Spacepope
: That happened right over my house. Flight was from DEN-PHX, the engine came apart right over Pike's Peak.

34 OPNLguy
: Perhap quoting me completely would help.. I intentionally left the HW/TW aspect out of the groundspeed issue so as to keep things simple and not over

35 CitationJet
: Agreed. Sometimes the entire engine comes off in flight. The 727 had a few incidences of the forward lavatory leaking and causing blue ice to break l

36 OPNLguy
: Actually, AA and NW were incidents #2 and #3, respectively--The original National Airlines had the first incident back on April 30, 1974. I wonder if

37 Remcor
: It's a good thing that the cowling was designed properly: it ripped off in flight instead of not ripping off and acting like a giant air-brake on the